Bioinspired Antiwear Poly(urea-imide) Composites: Influence of Tribology on Polymer Crystal Structure.

Polymer composite materials encounter considerable challenges in sustaining superior tribological properties at high rotational speeds. Inspired by the microstructure of dragonfly wings, a novel thermally stable and ambient pressure curing poly(urea-imide) resin (PURI) with excellent tribological properties has been eco-friendly synthesis using bio-based greener solvents. Furthermore, The PURI composites enhanced with polyether ether ketone (PEEK) and Polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) blended fabrics demonstrate excellent mechanical, with tensile strengths exceeding 175 MPa.

Constructing of efficient interface solar evaporator: In-situ colloid foaming strategy for solar desalination and visible light response sewage purification.

The shortage of drinking water has become a global problem, coastal cities can make full use of abundant seawater resources by desalination technology to ease the contradiction between supply and demand. However, fossil energy consumption contradicts the goal of reducing carbon dioxide emissions. Currently, researchers favor interfacial solar desalination devices relying only on clean solar energy.

Rational Design of Durable Anti-fouling Coatings with High Transparency, Hardness, and Flexibility.

Highly transparent, durable, flexible and smooth coatings with excellent anti-fouling properties have broad applications on cars, windows, and touch screens. However, the coexistence of these multi-functions is difficult to achieve in a single coating material. Here, a coating is developed with excellent performance of high transparency (98.

Modified montmorillonite synergizes with Co-MOF@PBO fabric to improve the wear resistance of PBO/phenolic resin composites.

Co-MOF (cobased metal-organic frame) nanosheets were developed onto the surface of PBO (poly(p-phenylene benzobisoxazole)) fabric, and OMMT (modified montmorillonite) was incorporated into phenolic resin synergistically to improve the wear resistance of PBO/phenolic resin composites. Co-MOF nanosheets with a large specific surface area exhibited strong interlocking and excellent compatibility between the fabric and resin. In addition, OMMT possessed excellent affinity with phenolic resin and a larger lamellar space, and then polymer chains could be conveniently entangled into interlayers, which further confined the movement of molecular chains caused by friction heat.

Ultrafast Fabrication of Metal-Organic Framework-Functionalized Superwetting Membrane for Multichannel Oil/Water Separation and Floating Oil Collection.

Traditional methods for oil/water separation suffer from many tricky problems such as low efficiency, high energy consumption, and difficulties in recycling and reusing. To address these hurdles, we developed a metal-organic framework-coated superwetting membrane for multichannel oil/water separation and collection of floating oils. The dip-coating method adopted in this paper is extremely flexible in manipulation and can be completed within 1 h under a low temperature without any assistance of high pressure.

Air Cushion Convection Inhibiting Icing of Self-Cleaning Surfaces.

Anti-icing surfaces/interfaces are of considerable importance in various engineering fields under natural freezing environment. Although superhydrophobic self-cleaning surfaces show good anti-icing potentials, promotion of these surfaces in engineering applications seems to enter a "bottleneck" stage. One of the key issues is the intrinsic relationship between superhydrophobicity and icephobicity is unclear, and the dynamic action mechanism of "air cushion" (a key internal factor for superhydrophobicity) on icing suppression was largely ignored.

Well-ordered polymer nano-fibers with self-cleaning property by disturbing crystallization process.

Bionic self-cleaning surfaces with well-ordered polymer nano-fibers are firstly fabricated by disturbing crystallization during one-step coating-curing process. Orderly thin (100 nm) and long (5-10 μm) polymer nano-fibers with a certain direction are fabricated by external macroscopic force (F blow) interference introduced by H2 gas flow, leading to superior superhydrophobicity with a water contact angle (WCA) of 170° and a water sliding angle (WSA) of 0-1°. In contrast, nano-wires and nano-bridges (1-8 μm in length/10-80 nm in width) are generated by "spinning/stretching" under internal microscopic force (F T) interference due to significant temperature difference in the non-uniform cooling medium.

A versatile approach to produce superhydrophobic materials used for oil-water separation.

Designing functional materials that can be used for oil-water separation in an efficient and cost-effective process is highly desired yet still challenging. Herein, three functional materials used for oil-water separation are readily produced by a dip coating process. Three typical porous materials including copper mesh, fabric, and sponge were dipped into the solution of polyfluorowax-hydrophobic SiO2 to alter their surface texture and chemistry, allowing them to exhibit superhydrophobic property.

Designing transparent superamphiphobic coatings directed by carbon nanotubes.

Creating surfaces with superamphiphobic property and optical transparency simultaneously would have fundamental and practical significance but has been proven extremely challenging. Herein, we develop a transparent superamphiphobic coating using carbon nanotubes (CNTs) as the template by a facile approach. CNTs enwrapped with SiO2 coating was produced by a sol-gel method and then sprayed onto the glass slides to form coatings.

Robust and durable superhydrophobic cotton fabrics for oil/water separation.

By introducing the incorporation of polyaniline and fluorinated alkyl silane to the cotton fabric via a facile vapor phase deposition process, the fabric surface possessed superhydrophobicity with the water contact angle of 156° and superoleophilicity with the oil contact angle of 0°. The as-prepared fabric can be applied as effective materials for the separation of water and oil mixture with separation efficiency as high as 97.8%.

Facile fabrication of a superhydrophobic fabric with mechanical stability and easy-repairability.

The poor mechanical stability of superhydrophobic fabrics severely hindered their use in practical applications. Herein, to address this problem, we fabricated a superhydrophobic fabric with both mechanical stability and easy-repairability by a simple method. The mechanical durability of the obtained superhydrophobic fabric was evaluated by finger touching and abrasion with sandpaper.

Facile fabrication of a superamphiphobic surface on the copper substrate.

A simple solution-immersion technique was developed for the fabrication of a superamphiphobic surface on the copper sheet. Hierarchical structure composed of nanorod arrays and microflowers was formed on the copper surface by an alkali assistant oxidation process; after fluorination, the surface became super-repellent toward water and several organic liquids possessing much lower surface tension than that of water, such as hexadecane. Such superamphiphobicity is attributed to the synergistic effect of their special surface chemicals and microscopic structures, which allows for the formation of a composite interface with all probing liquids tested.

Rapid control of switchable oil wettability and adhesion on the copper substrate.

We described a facile approach to rapidly achieve the reversible oil wettability and adhesion transition on the copper substrate. Plasma treatment and surface fluorination were used to tune the surface composition, and this tunability of the surface composition, along with the stable surface roughness, gave rise to the switchable wettability varying from superoleophobicity to superoleophilicity and reversible oil adhesion between sliding superoleophobicity and sticky superoleophobicity. It took only 1.

Rapid and reversible switching between superoleophobicity and superoleophilicity in response to counterion exchange.

We use a simple layer-by-layer (LbL) assembly and counterion exchange technology to rapidly and reversibly manipulate the oleophobicity of the textured aluminum surfaces. Such textured surfaces can be produced by the HCl etching and boiling water treatment of the flat aluminum plates. The LbL deposition of polyelectrolytes is performed on these surfaces to generate the polyelectrolyte multilayer films.

Counterion exchange to achieve reversibly switchable hydrophobicity and oleophobicity on fabrics.

We describe a simple layer-by-layer (LbL) technology and counterion exchange procedure to tune the liquid wettability of commercially available cotton fabrics. A polyelectrolyte multilayer is deposited on the fabric surface by the LbL technology, and counterion exchange is used to control the surface composition and thereby to modulate the solid surface energy. The tunability of the solid surface energy, along with the inherent re-entrant texture of the cotton fabric, results in simultaneously switchable wettability between a nonwetting state and a fully wetted state for water and hexadecane.

Rapid formation of superhydrophobic surfaces with fast response wettability transition.

We have developed a facile and time-saving method to prepare superhydrophobic surfaces on copper sheets. Various surface textures composed of Cu(OH)2 nanorod arrays and CuO microflowers/Cu(OH)2 nanorod arrays hierarchical structure were prepared by a simple solution-immersion process. After chemical modification with stearic acid, the wettability of the as-prepared surfaces was changed from superhydrophilicity to superhydrophobicity.

Reversible superhydrophobicity to superhydrophilicity switching of a carbon nanotube film via alternation of UV irradiation and dark storage.

We describe a simple method of fabricating a superhydrophobic carbon nanotube (CNT) film without any chemical modification. A remarkable surface wettability transition between superhydrophobicity and superhydrophilicity can be easily observed by the alternation of UV irradiation and dark storage. The adsorption and desorption of surface water molecules on the CNT surfaces account for their tunable surface wettability, which is disclosed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy analysis.

Reversible conversion of water-droplet mobility from rollable to pinned on a superhydrophobic functionalized carbon nanotube film.

Poly(acrylic acid)-block-polystyrene (PAA-b-PS) functionalized multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) were prepared by nitroxide-mediated "living" free-radical polymerization. The product functionalized MWNTs (MWNT-PAA-b-PS) contained 20% by weight PAA-b-PS based on the infrared spectroscopy analysis and thermal gravimetric analysis. Such MWNT-PAA-b-PS nanoparticles can be used in spray coating method to fabricate superhydrophobic MWNT films, and water-droplet mobility on the superhydrophobic film can be reversibly converted from rollable to pinned through adjusting the appearance of PAA chains on the topmost surface of the film.

Fabrication of biomimetic superhydrophobic surface on engineering materials by a simple electroless galvanic deposition method.

We have reported an easy means in this paper to imitate the "lotus leaf" by constructing a superhydrophobic surface through a process combining both electroless galvanic deposition and self-assembly of n-octadecanethiol. Superhydrophobicity with a static water contact angle of about 169 +/- 2 degrees and a sliding angle of 0 +/- 2 degrees was achieved. Both the surface chemical compositions and morphological structures were analyzed.